The 'Grill the Best Friend' Play
by Glitterycake
Summary: Chuck receives a late-night visitor to his bedroom, who's just raring to have a deep-and-meaningful discussion with him. Chuck/Blair one-shot, but not a Chuck/Blair one-shot. Read it and you'll get the idea.


_**Author's Notes:**_ This one-shot takes place at the end of episode 2.08, _Pret-a-Poor-J_. I wanted to approach the Blair-and-Chuck dynamic from another perspective. As usual, I don't own _Gossip Girl_. I just like to play with Cecily's characters. The title is a reference to 1.08, _Seventeen Candles_:

_Chuck: "_Predictably, your ex ran the, old, uh, grill-the-best-friend play. Tried to find out where your head was at. So uh, where is your head?"

By the way, this is a one-shot, meaning that it is complete. Thank you for your kind reviews, but please do not leave reviews saying some variation of "I love it but update, please!". It will **NOT** be updated and there is no point putting it on Story Alert. Thank you for reading.

**The "Grill-the-Best-Friend" Play**

Chuck was flipping through a soft-core erotic magazine, leaning back against the overstuffed European pillows and scorning the models, all of whom appeared to have taken the sport of fake-baking to excess, when a soft knock sounded on the door. He slipped the magazine under the pillows on the other side of his bed, straightened his shirt collar and brushed his fingers through his hair.

"Come in," he called, dropping a note of irritation into his voice. It was probably Blair. Well, he hoped that it was Blair, but it wouldn't do for her to know immediately how eager he was to see her again. A facade of being always slightly beyond her reach would serve well.

"Hey, Chuck," his step-sister greeted him. "Wow, you've primped a bit. You were expecting someone else, perhaps?"

"Sister of mine," Chuck responded, rising from the bed, "To what do I owe the pleasure of this late-night visit?"

Serena shut the door behind her and bounded over to his bed, sitting down cross-legged on top of the luxuriant fabric of the duvet. She wasted no time launching into a rousing round of Twenty Questions. She started off with "How are you, Chuck?"

Chuck smirked. "I'm the heir to a multi-million dollar business empire, my net worth is greater than that of J.K. Rowling, and at last count, I've bedded over a hundred women... I hardly think there's anything worth complaining about. Do you?"

Serena's navy blue eyes bored into Chuck's. "You know what I mean. How _are_ you?"

"I'm not sure I follow, sister dear. I just told you –"

"Oh, I know what you _told_ me, Chuck. You've bedded over a hundred women. But of all those bodies you've been on top of, only one's ever really mattered to you."

"The August Playboy centrefold? She _was_ pretty amazing. The way she put her knees behind her ears... that was one very flexible woman," he smirked.

"Chuck!" Serena snapped, exasperated, "I'm talking about Blair!"

Chuck cringed. Serena took that as her cue to press further. "What exactly is or is not going on with you two? You're like the will-they-won't-they couple of the entire Upper East Side! Are you two going to get together sometime this millennium?"

"Look, I don't feel like discussing Blair with anyone, least of all her best friend, who will probably open her phone straight after we finish talking and report all of my sordid recollections to her. Call me crazy."

Serena placed her hands on Chuck's shoulders. "Look at me, Chuck. Who in the world is better-placed to tell you what you want to know?"

Chuck pretended to think hard. "Hmm, I don't know, maybe Blair herself?"

"Yeah, but you two are allergic to talking things out rationally. I'm pretty sure it's been known to make you break out in hives," Chuck glared at Serena, who continued on, "It's the brutal honesty, you see. Neither of you are equipped to handle it."

"Give a girl _one_ functional relationship and she becomes an expert on everyone else's. God help me," he complained, turning away from Serena, who gripped his shoulders hard, making him turn back around to face her.

"What happened?" Serena blurted. "All I got out of Blair was that it was an unmitigated disaster. She beat a _really_ hasty retreat from the gallery. What exactly happened, Chuck?"

Chuck glanced over at the door, making absolutely certain it was shut, sighed and admitted defeat. "I guess Blair will tell you all of this in the morning, but she's right. It was a complete fiasco." Serena leaned further forward dropping her hands from his shoulders, intrigued.

"Tell me," Serena demanded. Chuck drew his legs up to his chin, wrapping his arms around them. He felt uncomfortably like a girl - like he was Blair, having a deep and meaningful with Serena. He swallowed and continued with the story.

"I met her on the roof of the gallery and made some disparaging comment about Brooklyn. She said 'at least it will be memorable' and I didn't say anything. She sort of opened her mouth to speak then shut it, and I said I was sorry, but didn't she have anything to say to me? She whispered 'yes' and I waited for her to say it. Then she said something about how silly it all was and wondered why we couldn't just say it together."

"Well, she made a pretty valid point. Why couldn't you?" Serena asked him. Chuck sighed again.

"We basically made this deal that she would say it first... anyway, I told her that we made a deal for her to say it and she asked me why everything had to be a deal. She told me that she asked me to say it first, and I told her that there was no way I would have, not at that White Party when she was going to leave with the Lord Our Saviour. I asked her really angrily if she honestly expected me to say it at that point and she was crying when she said she had, and she said that when I didn't, she – she wanted to die."

Serena nodded, encouraging him to go on with the story.

"I was so angry and humiliated, and then Humphrey Dumpty accosted me in the stairwell and told me how he'd basically sabotaged Blair, and that she was going to tell me until he stopped her."

"So is that how you left things?" Serena questioned him gently. Chuck shook his head.

"I visited her building a little while ago. I made this whole grand speech about how I'd rather wait until we're more ready for a serious relationship. I came to this realisation that any relationship between Blair and I would have to be fuelled by game-playing and without it, I'm not sure we'd survive. I told her that the reason we couldn't say those words isn't because they aren't true, but because it would be the end of something, as opposed to the beginning. I kissed her and left and I really didn't want to, but I had to."

"Well, you can't exactly argue with your logic, but I don't think the real reason Blair won't say those words to you has anything to do with endings or beginnings. I think that's purely your issue alone."

"What is it, then?" Chuck asked her. "I've gone over and over this in my mind, and I honestly can't think of another reason she won't say it."

Serena fixed Chuck with a sarcastic stare. "No reasons that you can think of? Well, why don't I help you out and give you a few?"

"By all means," Chuck shot back defensively. Serena ticked the reasons off on her fingers.

"Reason one: you left her alone in a foreign country where she doesn't speak the language."

"Please," Chuck scoffed, "Money is the universal language. She would have been fine."

"Reason two," Serena continued, "You pitted her against me and dethroned her so that she wouldn't be the Queen B anymore. You know as well as I do that that's her whole identity and you just took it away."

"But you've kissed and made up and she's just as revered as she ever was," Chuck protested.

"Reason three," Serena went on, "You sabotaged her cotillion." Chuck had completely forgotten about that.

"I only wanted to be with her!" he defended himself. "I was going to work everything out later."

"Reason four," Serena continued, her voice rising above Chuck's, "You compared her to a sweaty Arabian horse."

"She knows I never meant that!" Chuck countered.

"Reason five: you stole her answer to the Yale dean's question and told it to me. That's her future, Chuck. You shouldn't have messed with it. She still doesn't know how she's going to get in to Yale."

"I sincerely believed she would go elsewhere, where lame parlour games like that don't matter, and it's more about the kind of person you are, as opposed to your ability to get into an early-admission party!"

"Reason six: to her, you turned out to be as big a disappointment to her as Nate. He couldn't tell her he loved her; nor can you. He ruined her birthday; you ruined her debutante ball. Nate had sex with me; you held Vanessa's hand in front of her."

"Serena, I've never set out to hurt her," Chuck claimed, knowing as soon as the words left his mouth that Serena would call 'bullshit'.

"Maybe not," Serena agreed, "But I don't think your intentions have been entirely good either."

"That's true," Chuck agreed grudgingly, "but you have to agree that nothing I've done has been done without the ultimate goal of being with her. Being the one to make her happy..." he let the unsaid final words hang in the air between them.

"... Being the one to love her," Serena finished for him. "Why don't you just explain everything to her like you did to me? Look, I know Blair isn't necessarily looking for you to tell her you love her, at least not right away. She might pretend that it's her ultimate objective, but it's not."

"What _does_ she want from me, then?" Chuck wondered, exasperated.

"She wants you, Chuck," Serena explained simply. "She wants to know that you care."

"I care, Serena!" Chuck burst out. "Does she really think I don't? What person in this world would fail to realise that I care about her? Do these people exist, and if so, who and where are they?"

"Blair wants assurance that you won't let her fall like Nate did so many times. She wants to know that you'll be there for her, that you'll admire her regardless of how she looks at any given time, that she's the only person you care about more than yourself in this world."

"It's funny, you know?" Chuck started.

"What is?" Serena asked.

"I love her. I'm in love with Blair. I have absolutely no problem telling you and I had no problem admitting it to Nate. Why is it so damned hard to tell the one person who really should hear it?"

"It makes you vulnerable. It forces you to confront the very real possibility that the other person won't say it. Not because they don't feel it, but because they're scared, because love like that is real and terrifying and exhilarating."

"She gives me butterflies," Chuck admitted reluctantly, sounding much younger than he was.

"Butterflies are good. Never lose the butterflies. Because you of all people, Chuck, should know – there are very few people in this life whom you will meet that have the ability to give you butterflies," Serena assured him.

They sat there together in silence, absorbing the information that had been shared.

"Why'd Blair break up with the Lord?" Chuck asked Serena.

"I know you won't believe me, but she won't even admit the reason to me. I can't help you there."

"If she tells you, will you let me know?"

"Absolutely not!"

"Why not?"

"I don't trust you not to embarrass her about it. You may love her, Chuck, but your baser instincts seem to thrive when you can treat her like she's the damsel in distress. You need to see her as an equal."

"Hmm."

"Did you two have sex in my room?" Serena asked him, looking ill. "That's actually the reason I came in. I found her dress on the floor."

"Unfortunately not," Chuck admitted. "Some interesting messages came through on her cell. From _you_, I might add. 'In your room, this will be easy', and 'You're so _bad_'. I wrestled her for the phone."

"I gather you won," Serena concluded.

"I wish I hadn't," Chuck admitted. "Kissing Blair is necessary for my continued enjoyment of life. I don't like stopping in the middle of it."

"And kissing was _all_ that happened?" Serena questioned innocently, quirking an eyebrow at her lovelorn step-brother.

"I may have taken her on the carpet instead, had we been given the chance," Chuck acknowledged. "You're my step-sister. I respect your bed sheets."

"Hmm. But apparently not my carpet!" Serena teased him, "But I don't know – I can throw away the bed sheets. I can't exactly throw away the carpet."

"Is this your convoluted way of telling me that Blair and I are welcome to have sex in your bed, sister dear? Do you want to join in with us sometime?"

"Chuck!" Serena exclaimed, whacking him on the arm, "No!"

"In all seriousness, though... waiting for her is killing me and I've only just begun acknowledging that I am waiting for something," Chuck confessed in a rush.

"How long will you wait?" Serena wondered.

"I'm the one who said we should. I just don't know at the moment how long exactly that will be."

"Chuck," Serena said, taking hold of his shoulders again.

"What?"

"Blair loves you; she's just been too scared to admit it. I don't know exactly what you should do about it, but I know that you love each other and that is more precious than anything else in your lives, together or apart. Don't keep her waiting too long, though."

"Why?" Chuck asked her, "I'd rather wait until we're both mature enough –"

"Don't you get it? Senior year doesn't last forever. You two are on borrowed time, and you should make the most of it. She's headed to the stars, and you - you should take every chance you can get to be the one accompanying her on her journey there."

"I see."

"And Chuck?"

"Yes, Serena?"

"Blair's eighteenth birthday is coming up in a couple of weeks. Why don't you devise a way to make this one a birthday she'll never forget?"

"A thirty-thousand-dollar necklace can be topped?" Chuck muttered. Serena gasped.

"That was from _you_?!" she sputtered.

"Guilty as charged," Chuck responded. Serena unfolded her legs and swung them over the edge of the bed, planting her feet back on the ground and rising to her feet. She crossed to Chuck's bedroom door, and just before she left through it, she turned back to him and said, "Why don't you give her something that can't be bought, this time?"

"Like what?" Chuck asked her.

"Your heart," Serena said.

"Why?" Chuck questioned.

"Because she might just give you hers," Serena responded with a wink. "Good night, Chuck."

With that, she left the room, shutting the door softly behind her, leaving Chuck alone with some very muddled thoughts, a thudding heart, and a really unfulfilling piece of pornographic literature.


End file.
